The doctrine of atonement and reconciliation
to God by the death of Christ
implies that it was his death which constituted
the reconciling act.
It must be
conceded that if the natural death of
Jesus on the cross paid the penalty,
then it was natural life only that man
forfeited by disobedience.
If both of
these claims be true, then all men, according
to Scripture, were, on the death
of Christ, at some time entitled to a
resurrection.
Now, in the light of these
facts, we should desire an explanation
by substitutionists of 1 Cor. 15:17-18.
There the Apostle is credited with saying:
"If Christ be not raised, your
faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.
Then they also which are fallen asleep
in Christ are perished."
If the doctrine
of substitution be true, these two verses
cannot be.
If, as is claimed, the death
of Christ paid man's penalty, then,
whether Christ be raised or not, man
could not justly be in his sins.
Moreover,
if Christ's death entitled man to a
resurrection, and this, substitutionists
claim, then neither those in Christ nor
out of him could have perished because
of having previously fallen asleep.Day Star.

OUR REPLY.

The force of this expression, "If
Christ be not raised, your faith is vain;
ye are yet in your sins: then they also
which are fallen asleep in Christ are
perished," lies in the fact that if Christ
was not raised, he was dead, and could
have no power to bless the families of
earth, as he had purposed.
The death
of Christ as purchasing mankind, would
still be a grand expression of his love,
even though he had never arisen from
the dead to dispense the blessings which
his ransom-sacrifice gave the right to
bestow; for "Greater love hath no man
than this, that a man lay down his life
for his friends."
But it would have
been waste and loss to purchase us had
he not had in view a resurrection, which
would enable him to bless those bought.

But again, according to the types of
the sin-offering, If the High Priest performed
his sacrifice in a manner acceptable,
so that its sweet perfume filled the
Most Holy, then he should LIVE beyond
the vail and could come forth to
bless those for whose sin he had made
sacrifice; and if he lived not, it was an
evidence that his sacrifice for sins had
not been properly done, and was not
acceptable to Jehovah, and no blessing
nor remission of sins could come from
such a sacrifice.

Thus seen, Paul's argument is this:
Christian friends, you occupy an unreasonable,
a ridiculous position when you
say (verse 12) that a resurrection of the
dead is an impossibility.
If it is an impossibility,
then is Christ not risen: and
if so, why do you talk about being forgiven
your sins and having hopes
through him for the future?
A dead Christone not raised from deathcan never bless you; wherefore, if you
accept the good news of redemption
and blessing through Christ, be consistent
and admit also a resurrection of
Christ and the resurrection for all
through him.

Jesus' work for mankind is greater
and grander than some seem able to
grasp.
He bought us with his own
precious bloodsubstituting himself as
a man for the race of men, tasting death
for every man.
But this purchase of mankind was only a means to an endhe bought the race that (in due time) he might have the legal right to RESTORE
it to perfection.
Hence, both the death
of Christ was necessary for our purchase, and his resurrection was essential
to the carrying out of the blessed plan
for our restoration to harmony with
Jehovah.

Other statements of the same Apostle
prove that he recognized fully the
necessity both of the death to purchase
and of the resurrection to confer the
blessing upon those purchased.
He
says of Jesus, "Who was delivered
[into death] for our offences, and was raised again for our justification"i.e., in order that he might justify us. (Rom. 4:25.)
And again, "If while we were
enemies we were reconciled to God by
the DEATH of his Son, much more
[easily believed, is the promise that]
being reconciled we shall be saved [recovered fully, from the imperfections
and penalties of sin] by his life."
(Rom. 5:10.)

It was impossible for the Apostle, as
well as for us, to state every feature of
the plan at once; hence, in treating of
the resurrection in the passage above
cited by our contemporary, he does not
allude to the value of the death of Christ.
But blind indeed must be the reader, if
he has not seen that Paul and every
other Apostle and prophet laid great
stress upon the death of Christ as a ransom
for all, the only BASIS of hope for
blessings through him.

Here let us remind our readers that
those who deny that Jesus "gave himself
a ransom for all" should give some
reason for his deathan adequate reason
for so great an event.
To say that
he died as we die, because of sin and
imperfection, is to deny the testimony
of Scripture, that he was holy, harmless
and separate from sinners, and had no
cause of death in him.
To claim that
he died merely as our example (to show
us how to die?) is to furnish an inadequate
reason, for there are many noble
examples furnished in Scripture of those
who laid down their lives for the truth.
(Heb. 11:37,38).

The only adequate reason for Jesus'
death is repeated over and over again
in Scripture, viz.: that we being condemned
to death, he took our nature
that he might "taste death for every
man."
"He died for our sins," "redeemed"
us, "purchased" us, "bought
us," giving himself "a ransom [equivalentprice] for all."